It's been a while

… but here I am.

I haven’t blogged consistently in an epoch. This is because:

• I seem to be bad at blogging when there’s actual stuff happening in my life. 
• When I get home I don’t want to look at a computer
• I have a cat to play with
• energy needs to be conserved and put towards warmth

But, I’ve been told that I need to keep it up and I’m also finding that I’ve been missing it. Blogging means you pick out smaller aspects of life to relate and analyze – and in doing so it makes the whole feel that much more manageable. That said, I’m currently stuck not knowing where to re-begin. Maybe I should recap.

Since September I have:

• Got a job (non-profit volunteer management…familiar territory which has proved a good way of reacquainting myself with that old ‘friend’ work.)
• Started driving EVERY day INTO the CITY, often at 6.30 AM in order to avoid RUSH HOUR. 
• Got a cat… this has been the highlight of my life to date. He’s incredibly cute until he gets tired of being cute and starts attacking. He will likely feature highly in future blog posts. He doesn’t have a name…blame Jeremy. 
• Discovered that my new and wonderful house does not have insulation. This is also likely to feature…
• Become a master fire-lighter
•  Hosted a three course house-warming party for 50, Christmas for 14 and had eleven friends / family come to stay for nights / weekends / fortnights
• Watched a best friend get married
• Watched my little sister get married
•  Met with my agent (face-to-face for the first time) and a publisher who loved my book but not enough to publish it…yet…(she says, fingers crossed and recrossed behind her back)
• Begun to re-edit my book in the hopes that said publisher will love it more.

 Consider this as line drawn beneath the silence and I shall henceforth re-start blogging about all the minutiae that make life meaningful. 

They haven't all said no yet.

They haven't all said no yet.

But they almost have.

Four scary publishers (who do not heed deadlines) sat upon a wall.

The Nos I've had, as Nos go, have been very friendly Nos. Most have said that I can write, that they love the voice, the concept... not enough of course, but one year ago having publishers tell me I could write would have seemed monumental. So I'm clinging to that.

Today is Columbus Day, which I assume means we're celebrating the discovery of America. I'm celebrating the fact of a day off and am going to spend at least a portion of it writing. Because if / when they all say No, I need to have already reminded myself that I love writing, so that I keep on doing it in the face of the collective No I am anticipating (but still hoping against of course).

In other news, I still love my house, the new job is pretty cool and my parents are visiting at the end of the month. Life is good.

Waiting

Somewhere out there, there is a swarm, a scraggle, a torment of publishers on whom's desk / in whom's inbox lies my manuscript. They have 9 days remaining (8 in England, which is where they are, but shhhh) in which to read and respond to the submission. Two have already responded (and have responded No), leaving Ten.

Ten scary publishers sat upon a wall...

I try to forget, but my heart leaps every time my email pings. And I thought I'd escaped that feeling when I finally got a job.

Pah.

Watch this space - I may well be crying in it 9 days from now.

Here I am

No, I haven't died or stumbled off the face of the planet (which, I assume, would amount to the same thing), I am resolutely and definitely here, it's just that when life gets going, blogging kinda drops to the bottom of my list of priorities (which means, I imagine, that I'm not and never will be a true 'blogger').

Anyway, in the past month I got a job, hosted a housewarming party for 50 people (and fed all of these people a 3 course meal), submitted my novel to a swarm of scary publishers and started my newly attained job.

I'm tired.

But I'm also feeling thankful and very humble. I started this move to America with a list of necessities - things that I felt had to happen in order for me to settle and feel properly at home here. These were:
- Proper friends who, if and when necessary, I could call at a moment's notice and demand wine and a hug.
- A home without mold in the bathroom and a spare bedroom for visiting friends and family
- The ability to drive
- A job where I felt I was contributing something to the world and which gave me sufficient time and flexibility to visit England.

I have been given all of these things and more. My marriage continually surprises me in its capacity for joy. My house has not one but two bathrooms without mold and three whole spare bedrooms for visiting Englanders (and new yorkers / norwegians / californians etc etc). My friends are people who will be friends for ever more, no matter which continent I live on. And somehow in the midst of all of this I've managed to write a book which is this very second being appraised by people who may well reject it, but also might not.

I am blessed, and in my moments of anxiety and fear I run through this list in my head to remind myself to trust and believe and be calm. I do not mean any of this as a boast or a 'yay me' - more as a phew and a thank god, as well as a thanks to all of you for your patience with my moaning. It's nearly winter so no doubt there'll be some more to come.

x

In

We are in. In our new house, our new home, and the boxes have been emptied of their haphazard contents (and are now flattened and mountained up in one of the rooms that's waiting for furniture). We are in.

And it feels every bit as wonderful as I knew it would feel. I wake up happy, eager to get up out of bed and to start the day. I feel as if I'm on holiday (clearly this is helped by the unemployment factor) and I walk from room to room, marveling that I live here and that there are more than three rooms to walk between.

Right now I write to you from my newly christened 'writing room' (this is actually the first thing I've written in it - Book 2 is waiting patiently to be re-started). Currently the room is pink. Pink on pink in fact, because the walls are pastel pink and the carpet is dusky rose. It's also fairly sparse - just a desk (our old kitchen table), a filing cabinet, an empty bookcase and a chair. This will change in time - I want, for my writing room (known to J as the office, but whatever), a jungle of house plants (I'm hoping the resulting oxygen will inspire and energise me) and a bird feeder on the window sill. I may even paint (or stick those wall decal things) branches and birds on the walls and clutter the shelves with trinkets and ornaments of inspiration. Books will spill from the book-case and pile high on the desk and facebook will be banished to another room.All of that, in time, but for now I'm happy just typing in this sparse pink room, looking out over our garden and watching sparrows and squirrels.

One more thing before I go... we seem to have been adopted by a wild rabbit. I see him regularly and yesterday when J's family were visiting it seemed like he was following us around - sitting on the front step when we looked at the front flower beds, nibbling on the grass at the back when we sat on the deck. Weirdly, he seems to have burrowed into a big planter at the front of the house and has disguised his burrow by pulling bits of plants over the hole. I hope against hope that he's a she and she's pregnant and about to give birth to baby bunnies in a plant pot. Operation rabbit stake-out will be commencing at dusk.

I should be packing...

...little wonder then that I'm blogging instead.

That toes-to-eyelash tingle I've been getting about our upcoming move has not diminished. In fact, on a quarter hourly basis I'm reminded of something I'm leaving or moving towards and the tingle starts all over. In deference to Jeremy, who loves our current apartment for reasons unclear, I wont list all the things I will not be missing. Instead, behold a list of all the things I'm am ridiculously excited about...!

1. Washing Machine. We had one, up until the day before we went to barbados and it broke with all holiday clothing in it (in a foot of soapy dirty water). But even when it worked that one wasn't very good and we're moving towards one that a) works and b) is under a year old. Clean clean clothes!

2. Washing line. There isn't one yet but there will be. I don't care that Americans seem to think that only 'Italians' dry their clothes outside. The English do too, and guess what, it's great.

3. Full sized appliances. A fridge, freezer, oven and dishwasher that were not built for hobbits, and are in sparkly shiny gonna-be-obssessive-about-cleaning-off-finger-prints metal.

4. Air conditioning. Not that I'd use it often, but seriously, the past few days have been ridiculously hot and it's not fun.

5. A Piano. There's space and we're not moving for a while, ergo for the first time in my adult life I get to have one.

6. A Kitten... ditto the above, with a little more Jeremy persuasion necessary.

7. Granite kitchen tops...impractical they may be, but they're so pretty.

8. The Bathtub! With the bubbles!

9. And while we're on the subject of bathrooms... a bathroom that is not essentially in the kitchen and has a lock and doesn't have mould / damp / fungus growing up the walls and doesn't spontaneously drop wall tiles on my head while showering. Too obvious I'm referencing our current place? Oh well.

10. What to pick for my final item? There are so many things! Ok, the fireplace. Because even though it's too hot to conceive of fire right now, just think how unbelieveably awesome it will be in the winter.

ok I'm done.

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

Moving

This month we move house.

I can't wait - it is a tingle of excitement that starts in my toes and runs up to my eye-lashes every time I think about it. I never tried to settle in our current place - never cleaned the corners, so intent was I on moving as soon as possible - so I've never settled and the corners have remained thick with I-don't-want-to-know what. But OH, the new house, with its spare bedrooms and back yard... its kitchen big enough so that appliances can be stored (oh the novelty) IN the kitchen, maybe even ON the surfaces. And there's a bathtub that's deep enough for the water to cover my shoulders, and it has jacuzzi style bubble technology! (An aside: Americans seem to be anti-bath, or else think that only very short people take baths, because almost all American bath-tubs are stunted and shallow. Our new one is just stunted, and this will have to do)

I was thinking about it all yesterday and I realised that, not since I left home for university, have I known where I will be living 9 months ahead of time. Even my two year stint in London was plagued with the unsettled uncertainty of not knowing when / if J would move over and we would move apartments. That's my entire adult life spent in housing limbo. And it's all about to change.Yes, the annoying truth of our transatlantic marriage is that we'll never be completely certain that we're staying put, but for the time being we have a home. A home where I can let myself settle and clean the corners.

I tingle, I tell you.

Unemployment

I've refrained so far from writing about unemployment, inhibited by the idea that a potential employer could happen across my blog and somehow decide to use it against me. But 'unemployment' is becoming an ever loudening noise inside my head to the point that, some days, it precludes all other sound or thought.

Put simply, it sucks.

I'm not saying it doesn't have its benefits - I have just eaten lunch outside on the patio afterall and I didn't get up until 9.30am. But it does something to time, to days, where it sucks all the life out of them. I can't plan ahead to use all this time that I have because maybe, maybe, I'll get a job and then wont have the time to spare. So it sits, useless, passing me by. On days where I haven't planned anything - where I'm not volunteering or babysitting and there are no new jobs to apply to - the day passes in a haze. I do everything slowly and the smallest task requires the hugest amount of effort. My heart beats into my mouth every time the phone rings or an email pings; beats with hope that it'll be a job offer or interview invite. I miss the fatigue felt at the end of a work-day, miss even the occasional lingering clock-watching days; I miss the joy of leaving the office and reclaiming Time. I know all those reading this with full time jobs will be rolling their eyes in disbelief - the employed version of me, stuck in some parallel universe, certainly is - but it's the truth.

I want to be purposeful again. Volunteering helps but it's not the same. Writing helps but it's not yet been given the stamp of published approval, meaning it could just all be one long exercise in disappointment. I also really, really want to walk into Ted Baker and buy something entirely unnecessary but beautiful and to feel self-justified by the knowledge that I've worked hard for it, have endured multiple Monday mornings for it, have earned it. But, then again, I'm married now so maybe that guilt-free clothes purchase thing is a thing of the past... I need to get a job to find out.

A challenge

I have recently started volunteering as a 1-1 English tutor. I signed up for it, thinking it'd be a bit like my beloved Time Together, where I could befriend a new arrival and we could muddle through the confusement of this crazy country together while I helped a little with English along the way.

It's nothing like that.

For a start, my tutee has been here longer than I have. Thirty years longer to be exact. So if anything he is more American than I may ever be (please note that it's not a particular goal of mine, in fact remaining English against all odds is more of the goal). And he can speak English - yes he has an accent, but so do I. But, after thirty years of living here, he's decided he now has the time and the motivation to learn to read and write in English, and that's where I come in.


If I were to choose two 'things' that define me in this world, beyond family and friends and Jeremy, I would say I am a reader and a writer. A reader first, because I've been doing it obsessively, compulsively, since I first learnt to, er, read. And my writing comes from reading - it's through reading that I've developed a habit of narrating my life as I live it. In my head, I should add, although it'd be pretty hilarious if I started doing it aloud, and often in the style of the book I'm reading at the time. In this way I think I was a writer long before I started committing words to the page. I use language, absolutely, to interpret my world and to interpret myself. Without words, actual words, with their roots and derivations, their specificity of spelling and fluidity of pronunciation, I would be lost.

But when faced with teaching someone, teaching an adult, how to read and write I panicked. I started to see my world of words, my language, so differently. With its rules that I never give a second thought to, that are so slippery and wriggly - almost impossible to pin down, entirely impossible (for me) to explain. To get anywhere I have to narrow my vision, to look at one small pocket of the language and explain only that, to ignore for the moment the exceptions to the rule - they will, I assume, come later. Knowing all the time that he should put no trust in this language, yet, because it will move and unbalance him the moment he thinks he has mastered a part of it. I'd never realised before this how inexact spoken English is, how vague and easy to misinterpret when it is not accompanied by the knowledge of its written form.

Sometimes it feels impossible. It is too vast. It needs to be learned intuitively, with the instinct and trust of a child - who casually accepts irregularities and soaks them up into their very being so that they become fact and truth and normal. But then I think how great a gift it is to learn to read, to learn that there are words that can describe frighteningly accurately who we are. Words we do not use in the every day but that exist as counterweights to our everydayness. Reassuring in their precision, their beauty.

So we plod on. My biggest fear is that I am doing a terrible job. I am a reader and a writer, but not a teacher, and I know that I will learn as much from this relationship as he will - probably even about my language (certainly the UK curriculum setters did my generation a disservice when they decided grammar lessons were inessential) but definitely about how to teach. If nothing else so far I have learned a deeper respect and wonder for this language of mine. 

Everyone is having babies...

Everyone is having babies. I don't think that's even much of an exaggeration. I now have skype dates with 'people' who still count their age in months and whose length is measured rather than their height.

It'd be fair to say that it's freaking me out a little bit.

I can feel a strengthening tug inside me towards motherhood. Granted it may just be a longing to claim a definition that is something other than 'unemployed' (how many people get pregnant as an easier option to job hunting??), but I think it's more than that. Even Jeremy is less horrified by the whole idea than he used to be (he used to equate having children to death, so it'll take a while). But the bit that's properly freaking me out is the fact that I'm here, not there. Having children in this country feels like a root too far - one which would be harder to pull up than the others. And, for reasons related to yesterday's post, along with the fact that my mommy and I are really close, I could never imagine having children when living more than like three miles away from my mother. (OK, thirty - ninety, no J I'm not suggesting we move to Dibley). Yet here I am, feeling that tug, living in America, and I'll be 28 this year.

Like I said, Jeremy's only now starting to revise his thinking that you decide to have children once you've resigned yourself to your life being over, so I imagine there's a ways to go yet before we actually are faced with these decisions, but it scares me. There's the matter of maternity leave (so much better in England, but you have to be living there for a while before in order to be eligible) and the fact that deciding to start 'trying' doesn't mean a baby will appear nine months later. Which all seems to mean if 'we' (read 'I') want to be in England when we have kids then shouldn't we start thinking about it like yesterday?


There aren't any answers to any of these questions I know, because life just isn't that plannable; but when, aged twelveish, I mapped out my ideal life (married by 24, children by 25... I KNOW!) I never thought that moving continents would be something I'd have to worry about. (Nor did I have nightmares about my children being unable to say Worcestershire sauce.)

Ah well.

Now if you'll excuse me I have to shower and change in time for a skype date with a two month old.

In remembrance

Today is my brother's birthday. As far as the majority of the world is concerned, I don't have a brother, but I actually have two, or had two, depending how you look at it. I have two brothers who died while still babies. One, Samuel, before I was born and the other, Joseph, when I was two and a half. They died from what may or may not be an unidentified genetic disorder of which the girls in my family may or may not be carriers, if there's anything to be a carrier of (there have been various tests, each one being less conclusive than the one before). Today is Joseph's birthday. He would be 25.

I often imagine who they would have been - who they are, in that parallel world where they didn't die. A mechanic perhaps, or an artist. Maybe they'd be quiet and more serious like me or quick and deliberate like my sister. I've never pinned down an imagined character for either of them - they are nebulous in my mind, full of possibilities. The only thing I'm sure of is my love for them - we would love and like each other, I'm certain of that. They would drive me crazy and we would love each other fiercely. Because that is how our family is.

I think the loss of them has brought us all closer, bound us more tightly, for we know that it is possible to lose and what it feels like, so we love more intentionally and deliberately because of it. We do not talk about them often, but their loss is a presence in our family - one that we wouldn't be without, given we don't have them -  and we remember their birthdays as a way of saying outwardly that we have not forgotten. We do not need to say it inwardly. Today is Joseph's birthday. He would be 25.

writing

Writing is like painting a still life. There is what it should look like and there is what I am capable of painting. I know how it should look, how the colours should blend. I can see the outline of shadows and the glare of light. I can see it but recreating it, pinning it down and forcing it to paper is quite another thing.

The added difficulty is of course that I can't actually see it, only imagine it. The story that I have envisaged poses a question and it is my task to answer it, working through problems of words and character, slowly drawing out its true form which has been there all along waiting for me to wake up and realise it. It nags and it tugs and it never fully stops hassling until it's perfect, and of course it's never perfect.

It puts me on edge. In the way I used to be when I was at university - there is always something I should be doing, always a puzzle to unravel. I can never fully relax or forget, like a forgotten name on the tip of my tongue, my mind is rolling it and prodding it, trying to solve the problem.

I love it and I hate it and I'm not remotely convinced I'm capable of writing another book, even though I know it's there, waiting patiently for me to write it.

It should also be noted that my first book is far from finished, I'm just waiting for a kindly editor to come along and tell me what to do. 

Too much information

We are once again, tentatively and nervously, putting in an offer on a house. Our realtor suggested that before we did so, we checked out crime stats and sex offenders in the area. Not that sex offenders can't move, but just to check there wasn't one next door, because, y'know, that might hurt resale value. So along we trundled to the sex offenders register and I don't think I'll ever be quite the same again.

Because I had no idea that the sex offenders register here not only tells me the name of any level 3 (the highest level) sex offenders local to any area I search , but also their address, list of crimes and provides me a photograph.

Am I alone in failing to see how this helps anyone?

It doesn't help me - unless I'm prepared to live my life in fear and to memorise photos and addresses, and even then that doesn't insulate me from possible attacks, because there's such a thing as first-time offender or un-prosecuted offender or not-having-eyes-in-the-back-of-my-head.

Perhaps parents would feel it helps them - perhaps they'd like to tell their children who to avoid, or would like to not buy houses on streets close to pedophiles. I mean, no parent is going to intentionally buy a house next door to a pedophile, so maybe in some way it helps parents. But doesn't that also generate a false sense of security (for all the reasons that I wouldn't be safe even if I committed the sex offenders registry to memory)?  And why, if it's just about where to live, can it not just be a dot on a map rather than a face with a name?

But what shocks me the most about the whole thing is the complete lack of trust in any system of law that it displays. What it says is that a) these people are not (and will never be) rehabilitated and b) that there is no such thing as suitable punishment. It also says that the institutions that should be safeguarding children - the ones who should be doing background checks before hiring staff - are not to be trusted.

How can anyone ever re-enter society and move on and not re-offend if that society is watching them, ostracising them, waiting for them to re-offend? I know that sex offenders do re-offend, I know that allowing them to reintegrate into society isn't a sure-fire way by any means to stop re-offending, but it seems to me that creating a sub-class of people, publicising addresses and photographs is a sure-fire way to generate bitterness and hatred and to encourage re-offending.

In the UK, as I understand it, the sex offenders register is accessible by certain institutions and police do keep track of where sex offenders move to. This also, of course, shows a lack of faith in rehabilitation, but it's probably a realistic lack of faith, and we do need to protect our children.

There is a voluntary organization called 'Circles of Support and Accountability' that operates in the UK, Canada and some parts of the US whereby 3 - 4 trained volunteers form a "Circle of Support and Accountability" around an ex-offender, with the aim of preventing re-offending. A study of the scheme in California showed that participants in the scheme had 83% less sexual re-offending than the matched comparison group. Obviously there are factors such as that the ex-offenders who choose to take part do not want to re-offend, but that can not account for the entire difference in re-offending rates.

I've never written a blog post like this before, and I probably won't again, but I was so shocked by the discovery of this register with its names and addresses and photographs that I wanted to share it with you. I know one thing - I only looked at two of the names, out of curiosity that it was possible more than anything, but I don't feel safer. I feel less safe, and nothing has actually changed in my area beyond this knowledge. I have to say I think America's got it wrong on this one.

that buzz of homesickness

This week, homesickness returned. It's never fully and completely gone, but since those first few home-sick months it has retreated to a low buzz in the background, entirely manageable and mostly ignorable. Until it comes back. And when it does come back, it hits me in the chest and knocks the air out of me, leaving me feeling incomplete and lost in this foreign life of mine. Longing for familiar voices, food, friends.

So I mope around the house, with Jeremy reminding me that it's all entirely hormonal (it's been 'that' time of the month afterall). 'That doesn't matter'. I say. 'I still feel crap'. 'But it's got to help to know it's not real, it's not forever', is his point. It's a valid point.

But real or hormone fueled, I hate this feeling. It makes me feel insubstantial, awkward, unwilling to be in a group of people that are not MY people, because although I do have some people here, I do not have a gaggle of them.

The homesickness has retreated again, back to its normal level of buzz. But I am left a little startled by how quickly it swept in, scared by the realisation that it is never far away - always at striking distance.

But then I suppose I knew that already.

So

So I managed (somehow, inexplicably, miraculously) to get an agent. A living breathing agent who likes my book and believes it has potential and sends me editorial comments so that I can make it better and more publishable (or maybe just publishable).

An agent.

Wow.

Thank you God, thank you friends, thank you Jeremy for making unemployment = time-to-write rather than time-to-move-in-with-my-parents. Of course this doesn't mean that I actually will get published, but it means I have a better chance than if it was just little old me sending of my manuscript to publishers without another edit and without making it publishier (I've noticed that the more I get into writing, the less attention I pay to whether words are actually words).

That's all.

Jeremy got bitten by an ant.

On Wednesday night, Jeremy got bitten by an ant. I know because he woke me up to tell me and then proceeded to tell me by:

-leaving me a note
-sending me a text message
-writing me an email
-posting me a letter (stamped, addressed and everything) which I received today.

So, because he clearly feels the need to share this piece of information, I thought I'd tell the world (or all 40 odd people who read this).

It's not a particularly normal thing to do, right? But when Jeremy commits to a joke, he commits. For all I know there's a plane writing 'An ANT bit me' in the sky right now. It wouldn't surprise me. And this is one of the reasons I love my husband. Because, abnormal as he is, he makes me laugh. A lot, and often.

A ( relatively short) revelation

You know how in England, if a person said they lived in the South-West, that would mean that if you were to look at a map of England and mark off the South-West of the map, you'd probably have a rough idea of where this person was from. Anyone could do it. Even someone who had never heard of England. They'd be able to follow simple compass directions and work out roughly where you were from. Right?

Well.

In America it does not work this way. In America, a person can say they are from the South of the country and another person (say, me) could think about compass directions and draw a rough area on the map and might come up with a state in the south of the country. Like, perhaps, Texas. Fair enough, right? It's dead center and directly south.

But that person (the 'me' person) would be wrong.

Because, as I have very recently realised, American regions have stuff all to do with compass directions. In fact, you need a fairly comprehensive knowledge of the American civil war, of Mason Dixon lines and early settlements. The South, as Americans know it, isn't 'south' at all... it's south-ish... South East perhaps. Texas, apparently (which actually is south) doesn't conform to any compass directions and is simply 'Texas'.

And don't even get me started on the 'Mid' West.

Sigh.

It should be noted that it has taken me seven years to figure this out. 

On fear.

I've told you all already that I'm writing a book. I don't mean to go on about it, but it takes up so much head space I can't help it. Plus, somehow, in admitting it here, I am taking those first baby steps towards hoping that in writing a book I may one day be able to call myself a writer. Like in the boxes where I currently write 'unemployed' or, recently, 'homemaker' (which is a bit of a joke but they didn't have unemployed as an option), I might one day be able to honestly and unpretentiously put 'writer. Maybe.

I'm scared. Of rejection, yes, but right now I'm scared of what must come before rejection. I'm scared to believe in myself, to allow myself to hope. I'm scared to let other people see me hoping, in case they see me as some poor delusional reject like the ones they exploit on American idol.

Let me take you back fourteen years or so. Which makes me approximately thirteen. I had bushy short hair, acne and braces. I had to wear a blazer and tie to school. By this point I'd figured out that wearing my tie short and my shirt untucked just made me look more ridiculous than I already did so instead I wore them properly and, in doing so, conformed myself nicely to the geek stereotype. I hated school. I wasn't bullied, not really, but I felt stifled there. The uniform, the compulsory maths lessons, the unavoidable social cliques.

I wanted desperately to stand out and be different, to be exceptional in something. In my eyes, my only real talent was playing the piano. So I practiced. Three - four hours a night of playing. Obsessive playing so that one wrong note would send me back to the beginning again. Even today my little sister can't hear those pieces without crying out in despair. I decided I wanted to be a concert pianist. Never mind that I had acute performance anxiety - that my entire body shook when I played in front of anyone - I wanted to be brilliant. So I came up with a plan to audition at England's best music school, which conveniently happened to be a few miles down the road.

My parents took me to look around. The school is old and rich. Parts of Harry Potter were filmed at it. It smells of stone and had long corridors with doors behind which budding musicians played. I spoke to the headmaster and let my eyes sparkle when I talked about playing piano. We scheduled an audition.


My piano teacher came first thing every morning for a fortnight and I practiced before school. Finally the day came and I went and played my pieces. I played well, with feeling, a few wrong notes but that's not surprising given how nervous I was.

I wasn't good enough.

I had chosen the wrong pieces, I had poor technique, did I not realise that only the top 1% of musicians are good enough for this school?

To this day I cannot remember crying more bitter tears, cannot remember ever again feeling quite so crushed. I still played after that but less and less. My performance anxiety got worse so I stopped accompanying the school choir, stopped practicing as hard or as often, stopped learning new pieces.

It is this that I think of when I start to tell people I want to be a writer. It is that feeling that I remember and that fear I have to overcome.

That line between independence and loneliness

The past month or so Jeremy has been MIA. Well, that's not entirely true, I know where he is but he's not here and when he is here, he's working in a language I don't understand so he may as well not be here.

The language is 'Java', which brings to mind coffee and a far off land, but in Jeremy's reality means writing in 'code' and something about algorithms. Had to spell check that one.

The reason is that he's taken on an evening course in addition to his normal job. The course is through Harvard, which means it's difficult and he seems to be doing more work on this one module than I can ever recall doing in an entire year of modules when studying English Lit.

When he started out working late, it was a novelty. I quite enjoyed being the cool wife who was ever-so understanding and supportive. It helped that he wasn't having fun and that he took time to apologise for working late. What also helped was that for the first time in a year I was cooking for myself alone. Cue instantaneous return to Dr Oetker's frozen pizza, fish-fingers chips and beans, jacket potatoes and a not small amount of red wine from a box. After a year of eating like an adult and cooking proper meals (or being cooked them - I'm not the model of traditional housewifery, never fear), the sudden freedom to just eat what I wanted and not having to worry about whether Jeremy would want to eat it was quite liberating.

Equally liberating was my having a car and being brave enough to drive it. I was going out and doing things without Jeremy, coming home and cooking a satisfyingly un-nutritious meal and settling down to watch medical dramas. Bliss.

Until now when the novelty has totally worn off. I'm back to cooking proper meals (because there's only so much Dr Oetker one can eat before realising one's skin is turning grey from lack of vitimins), Greys Anatomy is doing that weird break-in-series thing that American TV does annoyingly often and the only places I can think of to drive to involve shopping, and I've already done a fair amount of that in the past month. Yes I could drive to art galleries and be all cultured, but... yea.

I miss Jeremy. And J, I'm not writing this to make you feel guilty - like I said, the fact that you're not having any fun makes it all much easier. I'm writing this because, well, because I'm sat here thinking about driving to the library (essentially just somewhere else to sit and mess about online) and pondering what to do with myself for another evening spent alone after another day spent alone and I'm willing May to hurry up and get here so that Jeremy's course can be over and we can get back to eating nutritious meals together.

On the bright side, it's pancake day tomorrow (I moved it). Which, if you don't know what it is, is essentially the singular greatest contribution England has given to the world and I have appointed myself as a pancake-day evangelist. So tomorrow, nutrition be damned, I'm cooking a thousand pancakes in ingenious ways and feeding them to friends.

Maybe I'll go buy eggs.



(I should insert a don't-worry-about-me disclaimer. I babysat on monday, went to a women's day event on tuesday and had an interview on wednesday. Life is not as dull as I'm making it out to be. Except for right now this minute and maybe a few minutes yesterday. But I do miss Jeremy)

One year on.

I am nearing a year. A year of America, a year of marriage, a year of living far far away from 90% of the people I love most. And I sailed past a year of unemployment over a month ago.

One whole year.

And here's the thing. The thing I breathe in and out with relief and thankfulness and more relief:

I'm happy.

Not just happy, I'm happy and I am in love. That quiet stillness that I found on a beach in cape cod almost a year ago has stayed with me. One year on and I love my husband and I'm happy.

Of course I'm not supposed to say I'm relieved. I'm supposed to act as though I knew all along that this would work and we'd be happy. But I am not a person that ever really knows anything, and there were quite a few massive variables at play. Things like us not having lived on the same continent in years and my frightening potential for being completely overwhelmed by homesickness.  This whole year has been a massive exercise in trust for me. Trusting myself that I made the right decision to move and marry, trusting Jeremy that he trusted himself, trusting in God for strength and the ability to take the year one day at a time.

And now, one year on I can say that I know:

I know that J and I work, that when we argue we make up within the hour and that he can make me smile even on my darkest and mopeyest of days. I know that I'm resilient enough to live 3000 miles away from family and still be happy, even though I miss them every day. I know that missing people doesn't equal misery, that the fact of having people to miss is in a way a blessing. I know that I am stubborn enough to hold onto my accent, even if occasionally when asking for water or butter or informing J's grandma that the soup flavour is tomato, I have to begrudgingly drop 't's and alter vowels, just for the ease of being understood. I know that I can make friends and, through doing so, that I can still be myself here - with my funny accent and love of pashminas - that the 'spark' of 'me' is not lost in this big new world.

I know I can be ok.

A year ago today, I was one sleep away from moving to America, and I did not 'know' any of the above. I only hoped and trusted for it - based on the knowledge of years of loving Jeremy and knowing myself.

Thank God it all turned out OK.

Seriously.

Fraud

For the next three weeks I have the use of a car, which is good but it also completely negates all excuses for not driving on my own. I have driven on my own a bit, but only really on routes I already know well and only short distances. Today I drove on the highway to a previously unvisted destination. And I didn't die.

Yesterday I drove to the supermarket and bought groceries (I've completely forgotten what we'd say in lieu of groceries in England... is it just 'food'?).

Yes I know this is all very mundane, and when I demand praise from Jeremy for such things, he looks at me like I'm asking for praise for learning to tie shoe-laces or count to ten, but it comes with the weirdest feeling. I feel exactly like an adult in disguise. As if I've donned adult clothing and am moving around undetected amongst other adults, but really I know I'm only an impostor.

I'm wondering whether this feeling will ever rub off, or whether it's just going to get worse when I'm a home owner or parent. And when I get wrinkles and grey hair, is it just going to feel like a more elaborate disguise? I'm not saying I feel young in that 'you're only as young as you feel' sort of BS, I'm saying I feel incompetent and unworthy. A total fraud.

To make matters worse I got asked if I was a teenager today.

It seems the disguise isn't all that good.

Mouse-trap.

Our apartment has mice. They're fairly polite - they don't come out and scare me or eat the bread we store on top of the microwave. They stay in one particular cupboard and only occasionally make noise enough to prevent me from denying their existence. I've been ignoring them because a) I don't want them to exist and it seems a good way to go about things and b) we're moving. soon. and I'm putting off all unpleasant jobs in this house until I no longer live here and don't have to do them. 

That is until yesterday when Jeremy produced mousetraps I didn't know we had and decided to catch them. What follows is an instant-messaging conversation and the drama that ensued.

 me:  I think we may have just attempted to trap a mouse...

 Jeremy:  what do you mean?

 me:  I heard the trap go.And I don't want to find out

 Jeremy:  oh yeah?  I emptied it this morn

 me:  serious? ugh

 Jeremy:  yeah

 me:  please PLEASE can we make an offer this week?????

 Jeremy:  theres a plastic bag with a mouse outside teh door. Ha.

 me:  nice

... (10 minutes or so pass)

Jeremy:  did you check the mousetrap?

 me:  nope. Because if I check it and it has a dead mouse in it, I'll have to do something about it and I really
don't want to

 Jeremy:  you just lift the spring

 me:  right but there's a dead mouse underneath it. I don't like dead animals much

 Jeremy:  me either

 me:  no but they're yours.

 Jeremy:  why

 me:  I'm not sure but they are

 me:  I didn't set the traps

 Jeremy:  I did because of you

 me:  no you did because you got fed up of losing chickpeas.I was perfectly happy pretending that I didn't  know they were there but now there's a dead one so I can't do that anymore.

The conversation ends there but in my head I know that there's a dead mouse in the chickpea cupboard.  There are cans and stuff in there too, but I'm guessing the mouse was mostly interested in the dried chickpeas, of which there are many. I steel myself and go and look in the cupboard. Sure enough there's a mouse in the trap. What I wasn't prepared for was quite how mouse-like it looked, or how big its eyes were. 

What follows is a comedic and stereotypically female response involving rubber gloves, a phone call to Jeremy, tears (of sadness for the mouse, illogical fear for me and hilarity, all rolled into one) and much hopping to and fro. I cover the mouse with a shroud (made of kitchen towel) so that I don't have to look at it and attempt to release it from the trap and into its grave (made of a plastic bag outside the back door...Jeremy's earlier mouse is also in it so it's fast becoming a mass grave). Cue more hopping, heart racing, tears and one bit where I thought it wasn't completely dead and dropped it on the floor. Eventually I get it together and deposit the mouse into the bag and wash my hands about 10 times. 

I do not reset the trap.

An epiphany of sorts.

Today, as if from nowhere, I realised something about myself that most of you probably already know.

I am impulsive.

This came as a surprise because in so many ways I'm not at all impulsive. When asked at a party recently whether I would prefer to 'burn out or fade away' (no context given then so none given now), I immediately chose to 'fade away'. Burning out sounds far too tiring and potentially sudden.

My idea of impulsive people is one of rash devil-may-care (not sure what that means exactly but it seems appropriate) attitudes. People who don't take extra pairs of shoes out with them in case the heels end up being the insensible choice they know them to be. People who aren't afraid of flying, who don't purposely travel at the back of tube trains (because a sensible terrorist wouldn't strike there). People whose favourite activity of all time is not reading.

But the evidence speaks for itself.

When it comes to big, life changing, should-really-spend-some-time-thinking-about-this decisions, I make them in an instant.

Go and visit man in America I've known for 5 days? Naturally

Embark on long-distance relationship when all evidence points to them being painful and, ultimately, disastrous? OK

Do Masters as a way to live in America? Sure thing (this was literally decided in an airport when saying goodbye to Jeremy)

Marry American and move whole life over there with no guarantees of employment or, well, anything? Easy (well, not easy, as you'll know from all my moaning, but the decision was made pretty quickly).


I think I've proved my point. In almost every area of my life, where big decisions are concerned, I listen with my heart. Move with my heart. And when my head catches up I ignore it until my heart makes the argument and wins it around.

Recently this has been a little problematic.

Because Jeremy is the opposite. When it comes to the small everyday things that I'm careful and sensible about, he's as headstrong and carefree as you like. He'll travel on any carriage of a tube train without a passing thought, thinks airplane turbulence is 'fun' and enjoys scuba diving at night in deathly cold temperatures. And on the small things he doesn't think twice - he throws himself into his hobbies with abandon. Bread baking, beer brewing, cheese making, vinegar fermenting. All things that I'd be cautious about because they take up so much time / the equipment costs money / they smell bad , he doesn't give a second thought. But on the big things he takes his time. Chews things over. Considers, weighs, deliberates.

I suppose you could argue that he's made the same decisions as me. He too long-distance-relationshipped and married a foreigner (one who practically wrote into the marriage vows a future move to her homeland). But he did so carefully, with thought. I made up my mind in an instant, Jeremy took, well, longer.


The reason it's been problematic of late is because we are house hunting. And we've found a house. A beautiful, party-perfect, walking-distance-to-shops-and-restaurants house which is not in danger of being consumed by a mud-slide and which doesn't have a septic system that will need replacing in a year. And there's granite in the kitchen and beams on the ceilings and a deck.

So you can guess my decision making process on this matter.

And Jeremy's.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately, depending how sensible you are), Jeremy is the one with the power in this decision making process. And by power I mean he's the one who's managed to save more than 10 pounds (that's coinage, not weight) in his life. And I do understand that when you've saved enough to buy a beautiful house, you might want to be careful and considered in how / when you part with those savings. You might want to understand the process and be fully aware of all potential pitfalls.

I understand, but it doesn't stop me from jumping up and down with excitement / impatience, waiting for his head to catch up with my heart.

And yes, I also accept that it's a bloody good thing he's the one with the savings power, because I'd have probably bought the house before this house. The one with the septic system and a hill ready to avalanche into it at the next rainstorm.

Uniform

Jeremy has accused me of using this blog as a moaning forum. He's probably right, but it's light-hearted moaning.

On that note, let me talk to you about cold.

This week has seen temperatures drop to record lows. We're talking -15 degrees C and landlords phoning up to tell us to keep taps(faucets) running throughout the night so that the pipes don't freeze and explode. We're also talking waking up to an apartment that's 12 degrees C.

No, don't call domestic abuse hotlines on my behalf, it's OK - I don't mind the heating being off over night and yes I do turn it on the second I manage to summon the will to exit my electric-blanketed bed.

But despite heat, there is still a chill in the air and consequently I have developed a uniform of cold resistance that I don upon waking.

This consists of:

Fuggs - because I can't afford real Uggs and I only wear them inside anyway...although I think they are responsible for the million electric shocks I've been getting whenever I touch anything, including soup.

Pyjamas / leggings / jeans  -  in that order, depending on how dressed I decide to get that day.

Chunky socks and / or legwarmers - worn over bottom of trousers to prevent drafts.

A million T-shirt type layers - no explanation necessary.

Massive jumper (sweater) - ditto on the explanation.

Scarf - because my neck is always the first thing to get cold.

Fingerless Gloves - aka homeless-person-gloves... although my reason for wearing them is so I can type. If I were a homeless person, I think I'd be wearing finger-full gloves.

Snuggie / Blanket - the Snuggie is a new addition and I only actually put my arms through the arm holes in emergency situations or for comedy value. It's supposed to be worn like an oversized and overfluffy hospital gown, complete with a pocket for the remote, just incase you're too cold or comfortable to reach for it on the coffee-table. However I prefer to wear it like an oversized wizards cape, with a tiny hunchback (from the remote pocket).

Hat. Also only worn in emergency situations. But they can and do happen.

And finally the all important hot water bottle. On hand for emergencies and bed-time. I was amazed to discover that Americans seem to have misplaced the knowledge of this time-honoured warming device. I thin kthis has a lot to do with their ignorance of the super cute teddy-bear-esque covers you can buy to go over them. I am hearby starting a campaign to bring them back in all their teddy-bear covered glory.

So there you have it. The Boston Winter Uniform for all sensible human beings (that don't have to go to work). The only thing I'm missing so far is a nose warmer. I don't know if these exist but they should, because my nose is eternally chilly.

HA! I just did a quick google search and they do exist. I think I may be risking my marriage if I were to include this in my uniform though. And my self respect.

procrastinating in unusual ways.

So I'm busy applying for jobs while it blizzards outside. The snow and I aren't great friends at the moment, but I'm campaigning to go sledging (sledding) tomorrow at an attempt at reconciliation.

Job applications. (Boo hiss). For the first time in my life though I'm using job search as procrastination tool. Something I can do and pretend to be productive when I really 'should' be doing something else.

What I 'should' be doing (and Jeremy would probably favour my procrastination activity, hence the inverted commas) is writing.

Deep breath.

For the past 6 months or so I've been writing a book. A story that may or may not adopt the form of an actual book. I feel ridiculous admitting that. It feels like admitting I'm auditioning for the X-Factor, following a long-held belief in my talent for singing. I should say here that while I do hope for fame and fortune (and by fame and fortune I mean a book on a shelf in a shop somewhere. I'm not hoping to be the next JK Rowling), I'm also realistic enough to realise that it's highly unlikely. I should also say that it's targeted at 14 year olds. No Ian McEwan or David Mitchell genius here. Oh and I definitely haven't spent every waking minute of those 6 months writing. The vast majority have probably been spent on facebook and watching various American medical dramas.

But either way it's true. And it's provided me with sanity- a sense of productivity, of non-worthlessness - while I've been busy being unemployed. And it's finished. Finished in the sense that it's got an ending. Not finished in the sense that I can stop working on it. Because after 'finishing' comes editing, which turns out is harder than writing in the first place. I feel like I've been posed a complicated maths problem that's niggling away in my head every waking minute. I have plans of attack, but very little attacking motivation. Or perhaps attacking ability.

So instead I'm applying for jobs, while sitting on the couch watching re-runs of 'House'.

(When is Hugh Laurie going to realise that he's just regurgitating the same episode every week and go back to speaking with an English accent and being hilarious?)

I suppose it's a fairly sensible procrastination technique - so that when I don't become a successful writer, I at least might have a job interview or two. Except I don't stand a chance if I don't cut the crap and start editing...

I'll start next week.

Ditto for the post new-year diet.

And exercise...

... although probably not exercise.

Snow.

"Whaddya mean you're stuck here?"

Jeremy says as I look out the window morosely, seeing yet another layer of snow falling down to further complicate any path I might want to take to anywhere that isn't our apartment.

"I mean, unless I want a full on expedition out of here then getting anywhere is pretty tough"

"Nah. Stop being negative. Snow is awesome."

I disagree. Snow is only awesome when you're at the top of a hill, sledge in hand, ready to whizz your way to the bottom. The rest of the time, snow is inconvenient, wet and cold. And everywhere. In the past two weeks we've had about 3 feet of snow. None of which has melted, all of which has been ploughed so that the roads are lined with snow-walls. Any attempt to walk along the pavement (sidewalk) is thwarted by intermittent snow walls and the fact that home-owners are responsible for the pavement outside their house and therefore the quality of shovelling corresponds to the errr quality of the homeowner.

Jeremy and I leave it all up to our landlord, who has a snow-blower so it's all fine

So, here I am, a newly anointed driver who as yet has only summoned the courage to drive across town to Walgreens and who definitely does not possess the courage to drive on/in snow (nevermind the fact that my husband has taken the car to work) and unless I'm prepared to snow-shoe my way into town (which I'm not), then I'm stuck here.

 Oh and it was 57degrees in the apartment when I woke up this morning.

On the up-side I got given a 'snuggie' (blanket with arm holes and a curious pocket which I think is meant for the remote) for christmas.

Does it get any bleaker than this???